FSF adds Guix System Distribution to list of endorsed distributions

BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA -- Tuesday, February 3, 2015 -- The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today announced the addition of the Guix System Distribution to its list of recommended GNU/Linux distributions.

The FSF's list consists of ready-to-use full GNU/Linux systems
whose developers have made a commitment to follow the Guidelines for
Free System Distributions. This means each distro includes and
steers users toward exclusively free software. All distros on this
list reject nonfree software, including firmware "blobs" and nonfree
documentation. The Guix System Distribution is a new and growing
distro that currently ships with just over 1000 packages, already including
almost all of the programs available from the GNU Project.

As the name suggests, at the heart of the Guix System Distribution is
the GNU Guix (pronounced like "geeks") package management system. GNU
Guix offers users uncommon features such as transactional
upgrades and rollbacks, as well as declarative operating system
configuration.

"The Guix System Distribution is a flexible, cutting edge, and bare
bones distro ideally suited for experienced users. However, both the
distro and the GNU Guix package management system itself have an
active and welcoming community of contributors. I look forward to
watching this project mature and encourage people to get involved,"
said Joshua Gay, FSF's licensing and compliance manager.

"The goal of GNU Guix is to bring the GNU system, as was envisioned 31
years ago, and to transcribe its ethical goals in the implementation.
For example, functional package management means that Guix provides
the complete 'Corresponding Source' of its packages, in the sense of
the GNU GPL -- users know precisely how a binary package was obtained.
Unprivileged users can install packages, and the whole system is
customizable and hackable, à la Emacs. We hope to help federate GNU
hackers and computing freedom supporters around the project. It's
ambitious, but because it can help strengthen GNU and defend user
freedom, I think it's worth it," said Ludovic Courtès, lead maintainer
of GNU Guix.

About the Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to
promoting computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and
redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and
use of free (as in freedom) software -- particularly the GNU operating
system and its GNU/Linux variants -- and free documentation for free
software. The FSF also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and
political issues of freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites,
located at fsf.org and gnu.org, are an important source of information
about GNU/Linux. Donations to support the FSF's work can be made at
https://donate.fsf.org. Its headquarters are in Boston, MA, USA.

More information about the FSF, as well as important information for
journalists and publishers, is at https://www.fsf.org/press.

About the GNU Operating System and Linux

Richard Stallman announced in September 1983 the plan to develop a
free software Unix-like operating system called GNU. GNU is the only
operating system developed specifically for the sake of users'
freedom. See https://www.gnu.org/gnu/the-gnu-project.html.

In 1992, the essential components of GNU were complete, except for
one, the kernel. When in 1992 the kernel Linux was re-released under
the GNU GPL, making it free software, the combination of GNU and Linux
formed a complete free operating system, which made it possible for
the first time to run a PC without non-free software. This combination
is the GNU/Linux system. For more explanation, see
https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html.